A typical data electronics enclosure includes a rigid housing that encloses a variety of components. One of the more prevalent reliability issues in electronic devices is failures caused by particle contamination in the housing. The particulates can cause failure to sensitive electronic components and printed circuit boards in the housing. Frequently, the particles that become present originate from materials and components assembled in the housing.
Extracting particles from components before assembling the components in a product and analyzing the extracted particles can be accomplished using liquid particle count (LPC) analysis and hard particle analysis (HPA). In both LPC and HPA, particles are extracted from a component or an assembly of components that are submerged into a liquid using an applied energy source, such as ultrasonic energy. The energy source removes particulates from the components and then moves them into the liquid. In LPC, the liquid is tested to determine a size and an amount of particles that were extracted from the component or assembly of components, while in HPA, the liquid is filtered and tested to determine what kind of particles were extracted along with a determination of size and amount of particles.
Unfortunately, the equipment used for employing the LPC and HPA methods of extracting particles from components are not production-ready tools for analyzing particles during manufacture. Analyzing particles using these methods are time consuming and can not be employed in a clean room environment. In addition, the ultrasonic extraction of particles from components can be destructive to the component.